Meet the Sunday Division Club Featuring Nearly Two Thousand English Top Division Matches
How do you improve a outstanding experienced side who have claimed consecutive championships, featuring a double triumph with thirty victories from thirty-two matches?
Bring in a raft of ex- professionals who have played at the top tier of club football and global soccer as you pursue more honors.
One Greater Manchester side has an amateur vets squad with nine ex- top-flight players in their present lineup.
222 Top Division Scores, Three Hundred Twenty-Five International Appearances
The team Veterans Over 35s are located in south Manchester and compete in the Cheshire Veterans League Premier Division.
Their lineup this season boasts 9 former Premier League players, with a collective nearly 1,800 elite matches.
The star-studded team also contains 222 top division scores and over 320 international appearances.
They feature Papiss Cisse, who scored thirty-seven scores in over 100 games for Newcastle United after signing for them for £9m from German league side Freiburg in 2012.
He had his first appearance for Wythenshawe in their most recent home game versus reigning champions Collegiate Old Boys and netted all six goals in a six-two win - including a 32-minute opening period hat-trick.
The team for this season also includes former professionals such as English and Anfield forward Emile Heskey, Hull and Burnley midfielder George Boyd, Everton forward Oumar Niasse, Wigan Athletic full-back Maynor Figueroa, Manchester City duo Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha and Premier League championship victors Joleon Lescott and Danny Drinkwater.
Collectively, the ex- top-flight players have secured fifteen major trophies and moved for total transfer fees of around £123 million.
Well-Known Names and Global Stars
Ireland began turning out for the team during preseason this season through good mate and present Wythenshawe player Blake Norton, and the ex- Irish player then invited additional former professionals, who all play in a midweek small-sided game, to participate.
Ex- Senegalese forward Oumar Niasse, who scored twelve scores in sixty-five Premier League matches for the Toffees and still goes to their home games, also had his first appearance against the opposition - who are based in Liverpool and use an Everton warm-up gear as their strip.
"My mate Stephen Ireland said 'come and have a game, it's a laugh'," said Niasse.
"After that he told me we were facing a side from the city and the shock I had when I saw them sporting Everton shirts - I thought this is strange for me!
"When you still love football and you feel you can still do it, anywhere you can kick a ball, what are you going to choose?
"The fans who come and see are pleased and to make a day if they see us playing there and to pose us questions - it's more like the pleasure of us having a place we can enjoy football, with structure of course."
So great is the strength in depth at the club, he made his debut at full-back.
"It's a little different but then, I enjoy sprinting and just go inside - I'm not defending that much," he added.
"I tell my defender 'I'm not staying' and that I'm just going to keep attacking.
"That movement is what I'm looking for. It's enjoyable."
'Surreal Experience
In addition to Cisse's six scores on his first game, Ireland has scored eight in three games for the side, while George Boyd hit five on his first appearance and Lescott, a centre-half by trade, scored a triple in one game as a striker.
The team are top of the Premier Tier with three victories from 3 and a goal difference of plus nineteen.
One opponent, thirty-eight, who plays on the flank for the opposition, came up against former Latics full-back Maynor Figueroa on Sunday - and had to tell his young son who Emile Heskey was.
He has appeared at two World Cups for Honduras, in as well as playing in more than 200 top-flight games.
"It was going round like a rumor they had these former top-flight players," remarked Barrow.
"I think I was a little starstruck playing against him to be honest.
"Also Emile [Heskey] came on and he's got over 60 England appearances.
"Our side held our own for a solid 20 mins but then we had a player sent off and it was hard.
"Our group literally have not stopped talking about it - I was calling my mother and brother on the way home.
"They were all really nice, shaking our hands after the game - it was like facing a bunch of normal guys.
"Now we can't wait for the second match."
We Will Still Take the Title'
Andy Kirby manages the Collegiate vets side, who secured the Premier Division title last season, along with Paul Maguire.
"Our team scored 1-0 ahead and had a